I believe it is more rational to believe in the existence of God than to deny God exists.

1. There is a consciousness underlying the physical attributes of the universe. This consciousness must have always existed (eternally) and must still exist. This fundamental monistic consciousness I call "God."

2. I make no religious statement about God whatsoever. The only positive statement I make about God is what I stated in #1 above. For the record, I am personally nonreligious.

3. Atheism is the belief that there is no God (as god is described in #1 above) based on a lack of evidence for said God.

(17-10-2012 11:22 AM)Egor Wrote: 1. There is a consciousness underlying the physical attributes of the universe. This consciousness must have always existed (eternally) and must still exist. This fundamental monistic consciousness I call "God."

Can you elaborate on this? I think some clarification on your observations used to draw this conclusion will give us a good starting point for debate. For starters, a description of consciousness would be helpful. Is that a deliberate force or action influencing the universe?

I know you have some personal experiences that some may or may not accept as evidence, but it's your statement, so I think it's fair you include them if they're relevant to your point.

If Jesus died for our sins, why is there still sin? If man was created from dust, why is there still dust? If Americans came from Europe, why are there still Europeans?

Statement 1 is a nonsensical statement and is not falsifiable or verifiable (I feel like this road has been traversed before).

Statement 2 is fine I suppose. I can't make any assessment of your religiousness or lack thereof. It stands to reason one could consider themselves a believer in god but not ascribe to a particular religion or set of dogmatic beliefs. The only viable question here is how do you approach the bible? Literally true? Partially true? Collection of myths intended to be parables for morality?

Statement 3 has already been fixed, but to reiterate the point that atheism is a lack of a belief in a god, not the absolute belief in the nonexistence of god. For instance, theist means belief in god, atheist means lacking a belief in god. This works the same way for other things like:
oxic = with oxygen
anoxic = lacking oxygen

aerobic = biological processes that occur in the presence of oxygen
anaerobic = biological processes that occur in the absence of oxygen

biotic = life
abiotic = without life

“Science is simply common sense at its best, that is, rigidly accurate in observation, and merciless to fallacy in logic.”
—Thomas Henry Huxley

(17-10-2012 11:22 AM)Egor Wrote: I believe it is more rational to believe in the existence of God than to deny God exists.

More rational to believe in something that cannot be seen, touched, smelled, tasted, or felt, cannot be measured, demonstrated or proven, and cannot even be agreed upon by the 6+ billion believers who, collectively, believe in thousands of different "god" ideas?

That's more rational than withholding belief until even one of the above conditions can be decided in favor of some god concept?

(17-10-2012 11:22 AM)Egor Wrote: 1. There is a consciousness underlying the physical attributes of the universe. This consciousness must have always existed (eternally) and must still exist. This fundamental monistic consciousness I call "God."

There is a consciousness? I can't even realistically prove that there is a consciousness in my daughter, my dog, or my neighbor. I'm curious how you know there is a consciousness in the physical attributes of the universe. Have you detected consciousness in gravity? In weak force? In string theory? Which physical attribute has consciousness? Can you demonstrate that? I'd like to have a chat with this consciousness (and it better chat back, at least a little, just so I know it's there) - can you set up a time and place for me to chat with the consciousness that you have detected?

I doubt you have actually found any consciousness other than the one you have made up (or chosen to believe in one that other people have made up).

But if you have, how do you know that this consciousness "must have always existed (eternally)"? Even if there is such a consciousness, which I doubt you have found, but even if you have found it and can set up a conference call for me, how would we know that this consciousness must be eternal?

Call it 'God', call it Buddha, call it Brama, Zeus, Thor, Osirus, Qetzalcouatl, call it the Flying Spaghetti Monster, but until you can demonstrate it, somehow, somewhere, then all you're doing it talking to yourself and making stuff up.

(17-10-2012 11:22 AM)Egor Wrote: 2. I make no religious statement about God whatsoever. The only positive statement I make about God is what I stated in #1 above. For the record, I am personally nonreligious.

Nonreligious in the sense that you don't go to church? Sure, whatever. But you're not "nonreligious" if you believe an eternal consciousness that underlies the physical attributes of the universe, must always have existed and must still exist.

That's not "nonreligious".

(17-10-2012 11:22 AM)Egor Wrote: 3. Atheism is the belief that there is no God (as god is described in #1 above) based on a lack of evidence for said God.

Nope.

Atheism is the lack of belief in any god. I suppose you don't see the difference. To "believe that there is no god" is a belief that cannot be supported. Nobody can prove that there is no god, just like nobody can prove that there is no bigfoot or Loch Ness monster. Choosing to believe in something without proof is silly. Sure, some atheists do that - they've convinced themselves that there is enough counter-evidence against all god claims to take the next step and deny the existence of gods. Fine. They're just as entitled to do that as you are entitled to have your own beliefs - but just because some atheists take this extra step doesn't mean that this is the correct viewpoint of all atheism.

Atheism is simply not believing in any god mythology. That's different than believing no god exists. One way to look at it is that I could tell you that my car is a Rolls Royce. You might not believe me. After all, Rolls Royces are rare and expensive and it's not very probable that I have one. But your lack of belief in my claim of having a Rolls Royce doesn't mean that you deny the existence of Rolls Royces or that you believe there are no Rolls Royces in existence.

(17-10-2012 11:22 AM)Egor Wrote: Do you agree with me?

Nope. Not a bit.

You could be right (see, that's me NOT believing there is no god), but I doubt it. I have no evidence for it. It seems extremely improbable to me. And before I go jumping on the bandwagon and start believing silly ancient improbable mythology, I'd like to find some reason, some little bit of real evidence, something beyond "hey, here's an ancient, flawed, mistranslated, self-contradicting, morally bankrupt book of fairy tales that tells us to believe in fairy tales."

So hook me up with a face-to-face (or consciousness-to-consciousness) meet and greet with this eternal consciousness that you have found, I'd love to have that chat.

Until then, no, I don't agree with you.

"Whores perform the same function as priests, but far more thoroughly." - Robert A. Heinlein

1. I would need a clearer definition of "consciousness" and "god", but from what I understand about what you wrote in #1, I would disagree. I have a few problems with the statement.

First, I've never seen any evidence that consciousness is eternal. In fact, I've only seen evidence to the contrary. From what we can observe, it appears that consciousness is most definitely NOT eternal. We can observe this by looking at death. When things die, their consciousness ceases. I have yet to see anything that would indicate otherwise.

Second, proving "god" exists is easy if you're going to randomly redefine it as you see fit. I can prove god exists too, so long as you accept my definition of god as being a synonym for "housefly".

Third, consciousness as I understand it, exists only within living things. This may be incorrect, but it's what we understand about consciousness in the present day. If we accept that (and we don't have to, but it would at least make the topic possible to discuss) then we also have to accept that consciousness MAY not be universal, since we still have not observed life or consciousness outside of earth. This to me indicates that consciousness is pre leant on earth, and may possibly exist universally, but without actual evidence, it's a conclusion I am unwilling to draw at this time.

2. Agree 100%. #2 is a statement about what you believe. I agree that you believe that.

3. Sort of agree. I understand what you are getting at, but as an atheist, I tend to nitpick at the wording. I'd say Vosur edited the statement fairly well to reflect what an atheist is, although I would also omit the part in parenthesis entirely. I would replace it with, "as god is commonly defined" since there is some questions about the definition of god in #1.

(17-10-2012 11:22 AM)Egor Wrote: There is a consciousness underlying the physical attributes of the universe.

Please define "consciousness".
What do you mean by "underlying" ?

re #3. No. Dismissal of claims, is not a positive assertion of anything.
If that were true then you actively, positively, believe there is no 1957 Chevy orbiting Pluto.
It's just so ridiculous any further consideration after the dismissal, is meaningless.
The dictionary defines a broad and narrow definition. You are denying the common usage.
You can define words for yourself, you cannot change the meanings for yourself, and then impose that definition on others.

BTW folks. Ed, (Egor), I have come to see, values our input, greatly. He comes off "snarky" sometimes, but these are "clarification dialogues" for himself. He's not here to convert us. He may say something, but he WANTS us to rationally, carefully, shoot things down, (or not), in order to think about things for himself. He's a good guy, and I presume good-faith here. He's been badly behaved in the past, sometimes, but so have I.

Insufferable know-it-all.
Those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music - Friedrich Nietzsche